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"All this gives us one way to understand the Lannister zeal for power in King's Landing. In effect, Tywin is attempting to execute a debt-for-equity swap since his debts aren't actually recoverable. But that simply underscores the extent to which the loans to the Iron Throne are, themselves, worthless as financial assets." Economics of Ice & Fire, Part I and Part II (minor dialogue spoilers for S03E03) [more inside]
posted by Chipmazing at 11:14 PM PST - 16 comments

Cirque du Soleil Reinvents the Circus: La Cirque Réinventé. Nouvelle Expérience. Saltimbanco. A Baroque Odyssey. Alegría. Quidam. La Nouba. Dralion. Journey of Man. Varekai. Midnight Sun. Kà. Corteo. Delerium. Koozå. All Together Now. Amaluna. Worlds Away. [more inside]
posted by zarq at 10:32 PM PST - 23 comments

Unsung Color Photographer Saul Leiter Is In No Great Hurry. [more inside]
posted by the man of twists and turns at 8:01 PM PST - 5 comments

“If I tell you, you’re not going to believe me,” Torres said. He was crying as he told them an incredible story about being recruited by the Defense Intelligence Agency to participate in a secret operation testing the security of Washington-area banks. He said he’d been assigned to rob a half-dozen banks over four days. And he told them about Theo, the man who hired him and gave all the orders—even though Torres had never met him.
posted by pravit at 6:17 PM PST - 34 comments

“This court cannot think of a more intentionally harmful act than a prosecutor’s conscious choice to hide mitigating evidence so as to create an uneven playing field for a defendant facing a murder charge and a life sentence." A Texas court finds probable cause that ex-District Attorney Ken Anderson intentionally hid evidence to secure a 1987 murder conviction against the now-exonerated Michael Morton. (Previously.) [more inside]
posted by SpringAquifer at 5:40 PM PST - 22 comments

Today marks the 70th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, the largest organized rebellion by Jews during World War II. Marek Edelman, a leader of the uprising, recalls the ghetto and the revolt. [more inside]
posted by Westringia F. at 5:26 PM PST - 10 comments

For those that think they chose the wrong subject of the new Finding Nemo movie, there's always the true star of the show: Crush the turtle. [more inside]
posted by arcticseal at 2:59 PM PST - 6 comments

SomethingAwful regular Velvet Sparrow is once again running the nailbiting and adorable Chickam, a live stream of chicken eggs in an incubator. The hatching action has started early this year. [more inside]
posted by Iteki at 2:44 PM PST - 34 comments

Tomorrow sees the start of the 2013 Snooker World Championship. A gruelling 17-day tournament held at Sheffield's Crucible Theatre, where 32 of the world's best players compete for a first prize of £250,000. This year, the pre-tournament buzz has only been about one thing: the return of Ronnie O'Sullivan. Indisputably the most naturally gifted player ever to grace the game, O'Sullivan plays almost as well with his left hand as he does with his right, and holds the world record for the fastest ever televised maximum break. Even though he has barely competed since his convincing victory at last year's World Championship, some people predict that he will win again this year. [more inside]
posted by ZipRibbons at 2:26 PM PST - 33 comments

"If you learned to play a musical instrument as a kid, you likely remember your first encounter with traditional music notation. You remember being baffled by the symbols denoting quarter notes, eighth notes, sixteenth notes. Or the difficulty of reading notes located above or below the staff. The Western system of music notation goes back hundreds of years, and it has been befuddling students for generations." A piano teacher and a data visualization professional team up to create Hummingbird, a new system of music notation which claims to make sight reading "easier to learn, faster to read, and simpler for even the trickiest music." [Via]
posted by Rykey at 12:01 PM PST - 103 comments

Bad Romances is a tumblr celebration of awful Romance novel covers (Related: Awful Fantasy Covers)
posted by The Whelk at 11:57 AM PST - 56 comments

Record Store Day encourages music lovers to support their independent record store on the third Saturday of April. Since 2008, the day has been growing in popularity, and this year more than 700 stores across the U.S. are participating. [more inside]
posted by rageagainsttherobots at 10:21 AM PST - 75 comments

Step by step tutorial on making beautiful abstract Refractographs; caustic patterns produced as light reflects and refracts through an object. [check the via for some amazing examples]
posted by quin at 9:05 AM PST - 11 comments

Play this accordion by resizing your browser window.
posted by swift at 8:20 AM PST - 25 comments

What started as a report of a convenience store robbery near the campus of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology last night has sprawled into a chaotic manhunt for the perpetrators of the recent terrorist attack on the Boston Marathon. The deadly pursuit, involving a policeman's murder, a carjacking, a violent chase with thrown explosives, and the death of one suspect, has resulted in Governor Deval Patrick ordering an unprecedented lockdown of the entire Boston metropolitan area as an army of law enforcement searches house by house for the remaining gunman. The Associated Press has identified the duo as Tamerlan Tsarnaev, 26, and his 19-year-old brother Dzhokhar A. Tsarnaev, who remains at large. Both are immigrants from wartorn Chechnya in southwestern Russia. The Guardian liveblog is good for quick updates, and Reddit's updating crowdsourced timeline of events that has often outpaced mainstream media coverage of the situation. You can also get real-time reports straight from the (Java-based) local police scanner.
posted by Rhaomi at 7:22 AM PST - 5008 comments

Paul "Mozchops" Phippen has been working as a concept artist and designer for major companies in the video-game and media industries since 1996. Two years ago, he made an intensely vivid graphic novel set in an imaginary world of insects and flora, with a story in rhymes that are somewhere between Seuss and Carroll. You can see four galleries of illustrations from Salsa Invertebraxa on Behance (one, two, three, four), and read some of the poetry on io9. You can also see some more of his art on Deviant Art.
posted by filthy light thief at 6:54 AM PST - 2 comments

One day, a small boy's holographic entertainment fails, so he heads out to explore the streets of abandoned shops outside. Down a forgotten alley he discovers the last ever bookshop. And inside, an ancient shopkeeper has been waiting over 25 years for a customer...The Last Bookshop
posted by Toekneesan at 6:44 AM PST - 26 comments

Aereo is a web service that allows subscribers to watch broadcast TV on their computers or mobile devices. The broadcast networks are furious. Aereo is ready for a PR fight, and is currently winning the legal battle. Variety wonders: Is Aereo Actually a Good Thing? [more inside]
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 5:40 AM PST - 41 comments

June 1874, and a peculiar sight could be spied over Chelsea. A hot-air balloon hovered a kilometre above the ground with the most curious of payloads dangling beneath: a gigantic bat with a human at its controls. (1 2)
posted by ersatz at 4:30 AM PST - 4 comments

"It wasn’t just Modern Tales. Keenspot, already established as the big name in webcomics sites, had members out in full force at that Comic-Con. A little group called Pants Press, consisting of a half-dozen Disney-loving teenage girls and one grown man, met in person for the first time after finding each other online, and the Pants Press girls wove in and out of the Comic-Con crowds in a blur of watercolors and cosplay fabric. Every member of that group is now a major talent in comics or animation or both. That summer, it was certain for the first time that webcomics were going to be a thing. A good thing. " -- As pioneering webcomics host Modern Tales has shut down, Narbonic creator Shaenon Garrity reminisces about how Joey Manley got it all started, back in 2001-2002
posted by MartinWisse at 4:14 AM PST - 7 comments

Photographer Matej Pelhjan collaborates with 12 year old Luka to create pictures of Luka enjoying activities that his Muscular Dystrophy make impossible in real life. "Slovenia-based photographer Matej Peljhan recently teamed up with a 12-year-named Luka who suffers from muscular dystrophy, to create a wildly imaginative series of photos depicting the boy doing things he is simply unable to do because of his degenerative condition. While he can still use his fingers to drive a wheelchair and to draw, things like skateboarding and swimming are simply not possible." [more inside]
posted by Faintdreams at 2:32 AM PST - 22 comments